Cocktail Confessions

Well, I wish I could say I was in more of a chipper mood these past few days. 

It’s been a while since I last updated my ‘State of the Bartender’ address, namely me.  I wish I could sit here and write about all the great BBQ plans I have, share a funny story with you (I have one in my mind), reveal a cocktail recipe, or something else along those lines, but I’ve been a bit…..depressed….lately.

A small series of unfortunate events, all obviously out of my control, have been plaguing me the past few weeks.

A good friend of my family passed away a few weeks back, someone who was pretty influential on my life for a better part of thirty years, and the funeral was this past weekend.  I’ve also been notified that one of my cousins has stage 4 cancer and has only a few weeks left…at best.

Additionally, while my cholesterol has reduced, apparantly it has not reduced enough according to my doctor and the new batch of medication he has put me on has some ‘unpleasant’ side effects….which have caused me some real and distinctive discomfort.

And lastly, my wife lost her job of eleven years, so of course our income has been reduced and her future uncertain.  She’s actually taking it better than I thought she would have, and she’s taking it better than I know I would have.  But all this bad news and haziness have allowed me to place a lot of personal stress on myself.  And one thing I don’t do well is stress.

It doesn’t help that these past two weeks, my diet (which I was doing so well with), kinda went out the window.  When I last updated my weight with you all, I had dropped about 25 pounds and was happy at a new weight of 211.  Needless to say, a few extra beers, a bit less exercise, and me scratching my head at the continual crap the universe seems to throw at my direction has allowed me to gain back a few pounds.  It’s not bad,…yet.  The other day I was feeling a bit sluggish, so a quick weigh-in confirmed my suspicion…I’m up about 4 lbs to about 215.  Well today I’ll be hitting the gym, especially after the large gut busting round of incredible Indian food I had today….but I need to get back to the water, the jello, the naked fish and steamed veggies again and much less carbs.

Anyway, just a quick update, and hopefully I shake this funk I’ve found myself mired the last few days into something more positive in the coming weeks.

Jon bottling beer

In my post published April 14, Brew Bakers (Part I) , I was able to share with you the experience of my friends and I actually brewing our respective beers.  It was a few weeks later that we made a reservation (April 2nd) to go back and now bottle our beer.

Unfortunately, due to unforseen personal reasons, Brian couldn’t make it that day but our mutual friend Jon would be able to step in for him and pick up the slack.

Brew Bakers happened to be much busier this particular day as they were hosting a children’s ‘root beer’ making birthday party along with pizza’s and a lot of anxious kids.  I can’t blame them for their excitement.  How many kids get to brag that they made their very own soda pop and then bottle it at a brewery and have artisan pizza to boot?  I know I would have enjoyed this as a kid myself.

There also seemed to be a large number of tasting patrons this day as well.  That is, not really making any beer, but just came in to sample various bottled creations up at the bar.  Something I’d also do more often if I lived a bit closer myself.

We had an intial start time of 2pm, but because of some paperwork snafus, the birthday party, and overall general bee hive of activity that day, we really didn’t get to start before 2:30 and some change.  So what did we do as we patiently waited?  Have some more samples of course!

Finally when a bottling station opened up, Sam was up first.  Seeing that he only had a 1/2 order to begin with and already a 1/2 hour behind schedule, we all chipped in to label his bottles. 

The bottling process itself is a bit mechancial and repetitive.  You place two (2) 22oz bottles in an upright stainless steel case with a plexi-glass front.  Once the front slides down, using a pnuematic control you begin to fill your bottles first with CO2 for a count of 5-Mississippi.  Then you flip the switch in the other direction to begin pumping your brew from your plastic fermenation keg into the actual bottle, about half way up the neck.  Once filled, we remove the bottles and then using a hand cranked capping device, we place the virgin zinc bottle caps on top and crimp in place.  Voila!  Rinse and repeat until all your bottles are done.

When the second bottling station opened, I began to ‘birth’ my 72 bottles, two at a time.  I didn’t have my labels with me this day as I opted to make mine at home with the artistic help of my friend Joe.  Once Sam was done with his 1/2 order, Jon was able to start on Brian’s beer.  I’m sure Sam volunteered to go first because this allowed him to get another ‘mac & cheese’ sandwich like we had before, (although it wasn’t as big as last months offering to his chagrin).

Towards the end of Jon’s and my bottling endeavors, we started to come up just a tad bit short in a full 72 bottles each.  I barely managed to squeak by….my last two bottles only filled about 2/3rds of the way up.  However, Brian’s lot came up short a whole 6 bottles.  The nice thing about Brew Bakers is that they guarantee a complete experience, and seeing that we paid for a full batch, they made good on their promise and allowed Jon to hit the fridge and pick any 6 bottles he wanted to complete the order.  So in a way Brian may be the luckiest of the bunch…he ended up with 66 of his own bottled brew and 6 various other home made beers that he could sample on his own.

We also learned that they have discounted brewing services on Thursday’s, so next time around I’ll be sure to book an appointment for a Thursday afternoon….allowing me to leave work early for a day and make some brew at a fration of the price.

Now as far as labeling goes, I had my friend Joe Tingle use his Photshop skills and come up with a label under my direction and our joint creativity.  He came up with the words “He-brew” one evening as we joked around and an image of Charelton Heston as Moses from the classic movie ‘The Ten Commandments’ came to my mind…hands outstretched before the Red Sea.  In each hand a 40oz beer.  I sketched out the design and left it up to Joe to come up with a prototype mock up.  His first pass at the label showed a lot of promise and I knew we were on the right track.  With a few additional suggestions from me, some changes to color, font size, and effects, the label was born.  When Joe emailed me the final .JPG file, I was ecstatic to go to our local office supply store and buy the appropriate Avery labels for my color ink-jet printer.  After an initial few test prints of diffrent qualities and sizing, we finally had our finished labels:

In the coming weeks, we plan on hosting a joint BBQ at my house where we’ll sample each others beers along with various sausages, hot wings, and other goodies.

With summer just around the corner, I hope to be Q’ing a lot this season.  I really enjoy hanging out in my backyard, entertaining my neighbors and friends with good food and better beers.  So with the unusually warm weather this past weekend, I had the opportunity to fire up the ‘ole gas grill and get back into the groove of things.

But what to cook?

Burgers…..nah.  Chicken….not in the mood.  Sausage…next week.  Just so happened we had a nice 3+ lb of Tri Tip in the freezer that we purchased on sale some months back just taking up prized freezer space.  So I took it out Friday night and let it defrost overnight.

But first, what exactly is Tri-tip your asking?  Well for you curious types (like me), tri-tip is small triangular beef muscle from the bottom sirloin primal cut (see picture).  And to do my closest Alton Brown impression, the scientific name for this muscle is Tensor fasciae latae, the connective tissue covering the Quadricep (a group of four muscles) which in turn insert into knee cap of the cow.  It generally weighs 2-3 lbs, but can be a bit or less.  It’s generally smoked over red oak, baked in an oven, or roasted on a rotisserie. 

It’s popular for sandwiches, and more recently replacing ground beef on the competitive chili circuit because of its low fat content (when trimmed) and low cost.

So let’s get to cooking.

First things first……take a nice sharp paring or like knife and trim off any excess fat flaps dangling loose.  I also like to trim of some off the uneven extra fat off the fat-cap (generally on one side) so that it is more uniform across the entire surface.  But like a brisket, don’t cut off too much.  You’ll want a decent portion of the fat cap intact to maintain the moisture and to enhance the flavor during a slow cook.

Now that the tri tip is trimmed, I went ahead and prepared a chipotle flavored marinade from an over the counter dry spice packet from the super market, (Lawry’s brand).  It’s made with 1/4 cup water and 1/4 cup vegetable oil and poured into a large plastic freezer bag which I then placed the tri-tip in and tried to get as much coverage as I could before placing it back in the fridge for at least 2 hours (preferably 4-8 hours if you can manage).

If chipotle is not your bag, go ahead and try another wet marinade, but you’ll want about 1/2 cup for every two pounds.  Otherwise you could do a nice dry rub as well.  Can I suggest something with a bit of rosemary or thyme in it, and go low on the sugar if you you do a dry rub.  Sugar may burn and carmelize a bit early on during the grilling and we’re going to get a nice crust anyway without having to complicate things.

About 1/2 hour prior to grilling, go ahead and take out of the fridge and allow the meat to come up towards room temperature.  During this time, go ahead and pre-heat your gas grill on high and after 10 minutes or so take your wire brush and clean off the grate as best you can so your tri-tip doesn’t stick.

Now that the grill is ready and your meat has been pulled out, there’s a few diffrent options/directions we can take this: 1) high heat sear followed by quick cooking at high temp, 2) smoking your meat, or 3) slow and low.

I’m opting for slow and low, meaning a longer cook time at a much lower heat.  This will help ensure a more evenly cooked product, reserving much of it’s internal juices, and also helping to tenderize the meat my breaking down that otherwise tough connective muscle tissue.  High cooking temperatures can result in fat flare ups from high flames.  I also don’t want to smoke it this time because my chipotle marinade already has a built in smoke component (chipotle is smoke-dried jalepenos afterall).

Now that my grill surface is clean, I turn my burners down to low and try to maintain an external temperature reading of 275-300 degrees F.  I then place my tri-tip on the grill, fat-cap side up initially, in the center of the bbq and walk away for a good 20 minutes (go ahead and have a beer now…you deserve it).  The reason I start with the fat cap on top is in theory, like a brisket, the fat will slowly melt and render downwards back into the meat itself, adding flavor and natural moisture.  If I placed it fat-cap down first, chances are much of it would drip straight into the grill….wasted flavor.

After 20 minutes, I break out my stainless tongs, and flip over once and leave for another 20 minutes.  Don’t worry if you see some crust or bark at this point.  It should be a nice dark brown color and look somewhat moist…all good and full of flavor.  As long as it isn’t charcoal black and flaking off like carbon (burnt), we’re in good shape…

Now that another 20 minutes have passed (40 total so far), go ahead and flip again to the orignal side.  Depending on how large your tri-tip is, you’ll flip it every ten (10) minutes from now on for the remainder of cooking time.  Since mine was just over 3 lbs, my total cooking time was about 1hr. 20 min. before I took it off to rest.  If yours is bigger…add time, if smaller…subtract.  But remember, as soon as you pull it off the grill, the carry over heat will continue to rise and cook from within for at least another 10 minutes….so its very important to let your tri-tip rest.

For those that are really skittish about meat temperatures, use a probe smack in the center.  Rare is considered to be 125-130 degrees internally, whereas ‘medium-rare’ is 130-135….and don’t forget about the carry over heat!

Place your tri-tip on a cutting board, and loosely cover with tin-foil undisturbed for 10-15 minutes.  This allows much of the juice to slowly flow back out from the center and distribute evenly before slicing.  Now’s a good time to get your side dishes out if any and call people to the table.

Go ahead and carve 1/3″ slices with a nice sharp knife.  Anything left-over (if there any leftovers) can be used in sandwiches teh next few days.

Enjoy.

Seems like this entry has been at least a month, if not more in the making.

At the beginning of this year, I outlined a ‘bucket-list’ of things I wanted to accomplish this year, and I started out with a bang the first two months.  I have lost close to 25lbs already, made at least 10lbs of two sausage varietals from scratch, built the basic framework for a 3.5′ x 6.5′ N-scale benchwork in my spare bedroom, and even attempted to get my friends together to rent a 31ft RV to go camping (that failed miserably, but not because I didn’t try).

Another item on my list this year was to brew a fresh batch of beer.  Well, I finally made the appointment back for March 12th of this year up at Brewbakersof Huntington Beach.  If you’ll recall, I mentioned that back in the spring of 2005 I made a large batch of ‘Frankie Beer’ (sure, it’s not the most creative of a names….it was named after my Mini-Schnauzer) and it was a hit with my neighbors, friends, and family for the 4th of July weekend back then.

Well here I am, almost six years later and I managed to get my good friends Brian and Sam to join me this time around for the experience.  We had a great time together; we tasted some phenomenal beers whilst brewing our own, had some delicious beer bread to take home from the used mash of our efforts, had a gut-busting grilled-macaroni & cheese sandwich, and of course just had a great time hanging out for the afternoon.

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It’s a tad bit more expensive than I remembered, but isn’t everything 6 years later?  Then again, Brewbakers has everything self-contained, meaning no large mess or epic scale clean up at my house at the end of the day, and all the tasting of fabulous brewed beer our fabulous hosts could pour down our gullets.  I swear, I think we were starting on a decent buzz even before we picked up our first bowl of grain!

Sam made a Chocolate Stout, Brian – a whisky inspired ale, and yours truly attempted a Honey Amber Ale.  By far, Sam’s recipe and efforts were the most complex….he had at least 6 pounds of various grains, chocolate, hops and more for his creation whereas mine was probably the simplest (although I added a tad bit more honey and cut back slightly on the hops to alter the flavor towards the sweeter side of things).  Brian and I each made an equivalent of close to a keg’s worth (72 x 22oz bottles), whereas Sam made 1/2 a batch (36 x 22oz).

It’s a really fun and educational process to boot, (so kids, tell your mom you wanna make beer..it’ll advance your knowledge in the history and science!).  Once you pick out a recipe that sounds good to you…many mimic the taste of many popular craft beers, or you can bring your own in as well, you’re given a kettle station, stainless steel bowls, measuring devices and scales and off you go.

Once you pick your toasted grains and measure them all out, you’ll need to mill them to help break them apart and remove some of the chaff.  Then into the kettle of boiling water where you’ll steep it every so often for the next 1/2 hour or so.  Towards the end of the rolling boil time limit, that’s where you’ll add you liquid ingredients such as honey, adjunct, molasses, etc. and give it a thorough stirring with large paddles.  Next, we hit the fridge unit and dig out our fresh hops to add and let sit a bit longer.

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Soon enough our respective brews are pumped out of their brass kettles into a plastic lined barrel where we then add our last, yet most vital ingredient: live active yeast cultures.  Once our yeast is added in to start the fermentation process, our plastic barrels are sealed up and stored away in a temperature controlled room where they’ll sit for 3-4 weeks before we come back to bottle.

From start to finish the process takes just around two hours.  Brewbakers has this down to an efficient science as they need to clean up the kettles, counters, etc., and get ready for the next round of scheduled appointments.  That being said, we were there closer to 3.5 hours, spending the first 30 minutes or so sampling various beers already on draft.  And while we were brewing and steeping our grains, we had one of the best grilled sandwiches ever.  The gooey mac-n-cheese on grilled beer bread was just divine.  All three of us had it and walked away more than satisfied.  If you’re still hungry, Brewbakers also makes their very own soft pretzels and rolled out pizza.

One of the best things about Brewbakers is its atmosphere.  Everyone is there for a good time, usually creating beers for birthday parties, anniversaries, special events, etc.  They also let kids come in and make root beer, and next door, if you like wine, there is a separate establishment that will guide you through making your own wine.  The staff at Brewbakers are fun, energetic, and friendly.  But still the best part to me is perusing the homemade labels.  See, since this is your beer, you also get to flex your creative muscles and design your own labels.  For a slightly extra charge Brewbakers will print out a few sheet for you, provided you send them a digital .jpg file, but I’m no stranger to this.  I have a color ink-jet at home, and just need to buy the appropriate Avery labels and make my own. 

Anyway, the walls are littered with examples and past pride and a real treat to look at.  Some are tame, some a bit more risque, most are funny or a clever play on words.  Some look like they were done in 10 minutes while others look like real pieces of art, but they all have a certain amount of charm in their own right and you cannot get bored discovering all these little slices of peoples lives captured in these micro-events of a 3″ x 4″ label.

Next…returning in 3 weeks for bottling!!